TO her legions of devoted fans she’s the outrageous, over-the-top, coke-snorting pop star with an equally flamboyant stage name.
But in the more intimate confines of her bedroom, Lady Gaga’s just plain old Stefani.
Asked which name she prefers in a tell-all documentary for American television, the 24-year-old – real name Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta – says: “Call me Gaga. Some people do call me Stefani. Especially in bed.”
And quizzed whether being called Gaga in bed would put her off, she replied: “Especially then. That would freak me out. It’s banned.”
The singer, who admitted to “occasional” cocaine use last year, is currently on the promotional trail ahead of her eagerly-awaited new album Born This Way – the follow-up to her debut The Fame which sold 13 million copies worldwide.
The first single, Born This Way, premieres today. It has been likened to Madonna meets Bronski Beat and Gaga superfan Elton John called it the “gayest song” he has ever heard, according to the clearly-chuffed girl herself.
Still in the mood for confession, Gaga stayed with the raunchy subject matter in another revealing chat with fashion bible Vogue, for whom she is March’s covergirl photographed by legendary snapper Mario Testino.
“Sometimes, being onstage is like having sex with my fans,” she says.
“They’re the only people on the planet who in an instant can make me just lose it.”
Gaga’s fans – who she affectionately dubs her Little Monsters – are known to be among the most fanatical in showbusiness.
The devotion goes both ways. She’s so dedicated to giving them the best show possible, she regularly goes overbudget – and ends up losing money on tour.
And last month, she personally leaked her new single’s lyrics and credits on Twitter as a thank you to her fans.
Talking about why she goes to such lengths to please them, she says: “I see myself in them. I was this really bad, rebellious misfit of a person — I still am — sneaking out, going to clubs, drugs, alcohol, older men, younger men.
“You imagine it, I did it. I was a really bad kid.
“And I look at them, and every show there’s a little more eyeliner, a little more freedom, and a little more, ‘I don’t give a f*** about the bullies at my school’.”
Performing to millions of fans on her recent world tour was like “open heart surgery” she says.
“I am quite literally chest open, exposed… bleeding for my fans and my music.”
And, in a none-too-veiled dig at stars such as Britney Spears who’ve been accused of miming, she adds: “I am not going to saunter around the stage doing pelvic thrusts and lip-synching. That’s not at all why I am in this. I am just a different breed.”
The singer hopes her own escape from the backstreets of Brooklyn, New York, to international superstardom and a £20million fortune will inspire others to follow their dreams.
She says she wants her fans to “essentially use me as an escape”, adding: “I am the jester to the kingdom. I am the route out.” Gaga adds that no one was “laughing” more than her at being deemed worthy of a Vogue cover.
“I was the girl in school who was most likely to walk down the hallway and get called a slut or a bitch or ugly or nerd or dyke,” she says.
Gaga also raises two fingers to critics who deride her as an attention-seeking wannabe who relies on stunts such as wearing a dress made of meat to the MTV Awards, last September.
She adds: “People are like, ‘She dresses this way for attention’. Or like, ‘Ugh, the meat dress’. People just want to figure it out or explain it. That truth is, the mystery and the magic is my art. That is what I am good at.”
The second single due to be taken off the new album is Judas, described by Vogue as: “Set to a sledgehammering beat and about falling in love with backstabbing men of the biblical variety.” Smiling, Gaga describes herself simply as “one of the greatest voices in the industry” although she admits rather more humbly: “I wouldn’t say that I am one of the greatest dancers.”
No interview with pop’s First Lady would be complete without a little strangeness and she provides it by likening her job to a “cheese sandwich”. “It’s not like, either good or bad. It’s much more complicated than that,” she says.
As well as strange pronouncements, the Vogue interview also offers an intriguing insight into her on/off relationship with bar manager boyfriend Luc Carl, 32.
Gaga and Luc, who met five years ago at a Manhattan bar where he worked, dated for two years but split over her then drug habit. However, they were reconciled last year – and he follows her round the world on tour.
After being introduced to Vogue journalist Jonathan Van Meter as “my boyfriend”, Luc inexplicably calls Gaga “Bette Midler” after the outrageous 65-year-old entertainer.
She also reveals how her Monster Ball tour has left her physically and emotionally shattered.
The admission comes after she cancelled a series of concerts in the US after suffering exhaustion and even collapsed on stage in New Zealand. “Let’s call a spade a spade here,” she says. “I am really f****** tired. I am at that last mile of the marathon when your fingers and toes are numb and you can’t feel your body, and I am just going on adrenaline.”
The physical, emotional and creative strain of the 18-month tour was intensified because the singer wrote most of the new album travelling between shows.
Her manager Troy Carter, said: “We would talk backstage about something, and the next day she’d play me a song relating to the conversation we had.”
At heart a devoted daughter, the interview has a rather touching moment when she talks about her parents Joe and Cynthia Germanotta who are both in their 50s.
Gaga says they’ve “wrestled” with her fame but are now coming to terms with it.
“I obsess about his (Joe’s) health,” she says. “I’m very Italian. I call him every day. I ask my mother if he’s been smoking… Nothing has changed since I have become a star. I am a real family girl. When it comes to love and loyalty, I am very old-fashioned. And I am quite down-to-earth for such an eccentric person.”
" earlier than planned (she tweeted on Monday, "Can't wait any longer, single coming Friday"), the hotly anticipated single has been all the talk among her Little Monsters. 
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